The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism.

To refrain from imitation is the best revenge.

I gave ‚em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if I had been in their position, I’d have done the same thing.

Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.

Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy, but in passing it over, he is superior; for it is a prince’s part to pardon.

Beware the tyranny of the weak. They just suck you dry.

Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.

If you can’t beat them, arrange to have them beaten.

Democracy passes into despotism.

To be angry is to revenge the faults of others on ourselves.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

If you lose a big fight, it will worry you all of your life. It will plague you – until you get your revenge.

If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?

I happen to be a big fan of Western civilization; I think it beats the hell out of tyranny and starvation.

Let my enemies devour each other.

Despotism can only exist in darkness, and there are too many lights now in the political firmament to permit it to remain anywhere, as it has heretofore done, almost everywhere.

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

Revenge, lust, ambition, pride, and self-will are too often exalted as the gods of man’s idolatry; while holiness, peace, contentment, and humility are viewed as unworthy of a serious thought.

So long as men worship the Caesars and Napoleons, Caesars and Napoleons will duly arise and make them miserable.

An eye for an eye only leads to more blindness.

The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other. Our children see this, and learn to imitate it.

Tyranny or slavery, born of selfishness, are the two educational methods of parents; all gradations of tyranny or slavery.

A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green.

One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.

Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as a heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors.

Debt is part of the human condition. Civilization is based on exchanges – on gifts, trades, loans – and the revenges and insults that come when they are not paid back.

There will be no end to the troubles of states, or of humanity itself, till philosophers become kings in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly become philosophers, and political power and philosophy thus come into the same hands.

Revenge is an act of passion; vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged.

Dictatorship naturally arises out of democracy, and the most aggravated form of tyranny and slavery out of the most extreme liberty.

I do not deny that I planned sabotage. I did not plan it in a spirit of recklessness nor because I have any love of violence. I planned it as a result of a calm and sober assessment of the political situation that had arisen after many years of tyranny, exploitation and oppression of my people by the whites.

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.

It takes two to make a murder. There are born victims, born to have their throats cut, as the cut-throats are born to be hanged.

A dogmatic belief in objective value is necessary to the very idea of a rule which is not tyranny or an obedience which is not slavery.

From behind the Iron Curtain, there are signs that tyranny is in trouble and reminders that its structure is as brittle as its surface is hard.

Where is the justice of political power if it executes the murderer and jails the plunderer, and then itself marches upon neighboring lands, killing thousands and pillaging the very hills?

In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior.

The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.

When you look at a corporation, just like when you look at a slave owner, you want to distinguish between the institution and the individual. So slavery, for example, or other forms of tyranny, are inherently monstrous. The individuals participating in them may be the nicest guys you can imagine.

Virtuous people often revenge themselves for the constraints to which they submit by the boredom which they inspire.

Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.

Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more a man’s nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out.

Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.

The tyranny of a multitude is a multiplied tyranny.

And if you’re horrible to me I’m going to write a song about you and you are not going to like it. That’s how I operate.

It is impossible to suffer without making someone pay for it; every complaint already contains revenge.

Real liberty is neither found in despotism or the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments.

When the white man governs himself, that is self-government; but when he governs himself and also governs another man, that is more than self-government – that is despotism.

Before Nelson Mandela was arrested in 1962, he was an angry, relatively young man. He founded the ANC’s military wing. When he was released, he surprised everyone because he was talking about reconciliation and forgiveness and not about revenge.

Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‚within the limits of the law‘ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.

Kings will be tyrants from policy, when subjects are rebels from principle.

There are minds so impatient of inferiority that their gratitude is a species of revenge, and they return benefits, not because recompense is a pleasure, but because obligation is a pain.

All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.

Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.

Men should be either treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries – for heavy ones they cannot.

Concentration of wealth yields concentration of political power. And concentration of political power gives rise to legislation that increases and accelerates the cycle.

Tyranny naturally arises out of democracy.

Although we resolutely supported the armed struggle against Batista’s tyranny, we were, on principle, opposed to any terrorist action that could cause the death of innocent people.

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

As President Nixon says, presidents can do almost anything, and President Nixon has done many things that nobody would have thought of doing.

It is not my nature, when I see a people borne down by the weight of their shackles – the oppression of tyranny – to make their life more bitter by heaping upon them greater burdens; but rather would I do all in my power to raise the yoke than to add anything that would tend to crush them.

Those wars are unjust which are undertaken without provocation. For only a war waged for revenge or defense can be just.